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Justice L. Narasimha Reddy:-
These two OAs and the CP arise under certain peculiar circumstances. Briefly stated, the facts are as under:
2. Section Officer (SO) is one of the posts in the Railway Board Secretariat Service (RBSS). The cadre was constituted in the year 1970. Appointment to that is partly through direct recruitment, and partly through other methods such as promotion on the basis of seniority from the feeder category through Limited Departmental Competitive Examination (LDCE) and from the category of Stenographers.
"181. Under the law as laid down by the Hon‟ble Apex Court in its order dated 16.02.2006 in Civil Appeal No. 8568 of 2002 Union of India & Anr. vs. I.P. Awasthi & Ors., this Tribunal does not have the power to order only for prospective operation of its orders, which power is available only to the Hon‟ble Apex Court, and, therefore, all the above directions and determinations of the OA No.2278/18, OA No.4309/17 & principles of law applicable in respect of these two cases covered by this Common Order would operate in the RBSS from the very inception of the RBSS as a separate service.
182. With these directions, these two connected OAs are disposed of, and the impugned Memorandum dated 22.12.2008 issued by the Secretary Railway Board, is set aside, and he is directed to issue fresh year- wise Seniority Lists of Section Officers from 1970 onwards, taking into account the above principles. The Respondent No.1 is, therefore, directed to re-cast the entire year-wise Seniority Lists of the RBSS at the level of Section Officers, from the very beginning of the RBSS as a Service, on the basis of principles as have been explained above, which may again be summarised as below:-
v) The seniority in the cadre of Section Officers at level-3 of RBSS so determined, in the manner as indicated above, shall alone be taken into consideration of further OA No.2278/18, OA No.4309/17 & promotions to level-2 and level-1 of RBSS thereafter.
vi) The Respondent No.1 shall, after finalization of the SOs‟ level Seniority List, convene DPCs or Review DPCs, for considering year-wise further promotions of all the incumbent SOs in that seniority list as Under Secretaries and Deputy Secretaries etc., and so on.